The Saga of Harlan Waugh (The Mountain Men) (20 page)

He spoke slowly so his words’ importance would not be lost in the excitement of the moment. “There will be extra protection traveling across this land with a larger contingent of fighters, especially with the addition of our guns. Plus, they will know the way, will be our friends, and in the end will give all of you a chance to live happily among your own people. Now, does anyone have an objection or concern over what I am proposing?”

For the longest time no one spoke. They all sat in deep thought. Then Big Eagle rose as if to emphasize his point and said, “I would like to see what it is like to live among my own kind and hunt buffalo for a living. I am also tired of wading in the cold water all the time for beaver.” With that, he sat down and quietly stared into the fire.

Runs Fast rose and said, “I too would like to return to the land of my kind and see what is there. Maybe I can find some of my own family there as well.” Like his brother, he abruptly sat back down as if to finalize his words

Birdsong rose and said, “I would like to go with my brothers, and Autumn Flower would like to go with her husband.”

Looking over at Winter Hawk, all Harlan could see was a man still sore from the recent battle with the Northern Cheyenne. But his youngest son also possessed a big smile at the possibility of returning home and seeing what it would be like to live among his own kind.

“Then it is done,” said Harlan with a tone of finality. “Tomorrow I will ride up and meet with the Crow chief and see what kind of a man he is. If he is a good man and a leader, I will ask him to take us in as brothers and show us his land so we might live in peace with a greater degree of safety. Then, if he agrees that we can go with him to the land of the Crow, we will come back to the rendezvous and, using our credit and some of the captured Northern Cheyenne horses for trade, procure what we will need for such a journey.

If not, I propose we move south to hunt buffalo and continue our trapping as long as we can make a living. There are trading posts as far south as the St. Vrain and Arkansas Rivers as well as west to Taos and Santa Fe. If necessary, we will trade our goods there instead of at the rendezvous,” said Harlan as if laying out their future in stone. Looking around, Harlan could see everyone was in deep thought at what had been said that evening.

“Boys,” he continued, “tomorrow I want all of you to remain in camp and protect the horse herd. I saw lots of covetous eyes looking them over among the trappers and the Indians because good horseflesh is so hard to come by. So be alert and on the lookout for trouble.”

All the boys looked at him in unison with the realization that the trading of those horses might very well be their ticket back to their homeland and allow them to purchase enough supplies for two years of life in the backcountry.

Woe be to any horse thief not correctly reading the meaning behind their eyes, thought Harlan with a smile.

Chapter Twenty-Two

The Crow Camp

Daylight the next morning found Harlan quietly sitting on his horse at the edge of the Crow encampment. The camp was a fairly large one, consisting of thirty-two tepees. It likely held about one hundred twenty-five men, women, and children as near as Harlan could determine from his past experiences with Indian-camp layouts.

Behind him was a mule carrying a few gifts for the Crow chief if everything went according to plan. If not, he, the mule, and his horse would have a long, disappointing ride back to his camp.

As the Crow camp awoke and smoke from the cooking fires in the tepees rose lazily into the chill morning air, hardly anyone stirring paid much attention to Harlan sitting on his horse at a little distance. Then a Crow warrior noticed that the lone rider was a white man and paused to stare long and hard.

Without haste, the warrior walked to the center of the village to a tepee marked by a long staff of eagle feathers stuck in the ground out front. Standing outside, he said something to the tepee’s occupants. Shortly thereafter, the door flap was thrown back, and out walked a magnificent specimen of a man. Bare-chested, at least six feet tall, and wearing only long deer-skin pants, elaborately beaded moccasins, and a double-train war bonnet made from eagle feathers, he listened to what the warrior had to say.

After a short conversation, the warrior trotted off and began visiting a number of other tepees as if alerting those inside. Soon the camp began to swarm with armed warriors as the chief stood in front of his tepee looking at the lone white man sitting on his horse overlooking their camp.

About thirty warriors gathered at the chief’s tepee, and they too quietly watched the man sitting outside their camp. Then the chief raised his hand in the sign of peace and beckoned Harlan toward him. Harlan made the sign of peace and slowly walked his horse and mule into the Crow camp, right up to the chief. Stopping about ten feet from the chief, he sat looking at the man while the chief and his people quietly looked back.

Then the chief beckoned for Harlan to dismount, which he did. Harlan stood six feet two inches in his moccasins, which was big for a man in his day. It was obvious that the chief noticed his stature and bearing as well as his badly scarred head and face.

The two large men stood for another moment looking at each other.

“Do you speak Crow?” asked the chief.

“Very well,” replied Harlan in the man’s native tongue, which seemed to surprise the man.

“What do you want, white man?” asked the chief.

“I come to parley with the great Crow chief,” said Harlan not outlining his needs any further.

The chief stood looking at Harlan, and Harlan never took his eyes off the man in his attempt to read who he really was.

With a flourish of his arm, the chief opened the flap of his tepee and beckoned Harlan to enter.

“I ask the great Crow chief to protect my animals and goods,” Harlan requested in a respectful tone.

Again the chief looked long and hard at Harlan, and Harlan did the same right back. Turning, the chief asked a warrior to hold the reins of the two animals and beckoned once again for Harlan to enter his tepee.

Ducking, Harlan entered the tepee. Inside, a small cooking fire burned, and two women scurried off to one side and stood with their eyes downcast in a sign of respect. Entering the tepee, the chief moved to the right of the campfire and sat down. Then he beckoned for Harlan to sit, which he did. Once he was seated, one of the women brought the chief a brightly beaded leather bag and then scurried off to one side of the tepee again.

Harlan noticed that the other woman standing near her, probably a daughter, was young, possibly in her late teens, and very beautiful like Birdsong.

Reaching into the leather ceremonial bag, the chief took out a sacred pipe, stuffed it with tobacco, removed a small stick with a burning end from the fire, and used it to light the pipe. He took several long pulls on the pipe and then pointed it to Mother Earth and the sky, blowing out smoke, which he brushed back into his face with his hand.

Then he handed the pipe to Harlan. Harlan correctly took the bowl of the pipe in his left hand and the stem with his right. Taking several deep puffs on the pipe, he too pointed it to Mother Earth and the sky, blowing out the smoke and then pulling it gently back with a cupped hand over his face and head for the blessings it brought.

The Crow chief smiled at the good manners of the white man, took back the pipe, laid it by his side, and said, “What is it the white man desires from Chief White Bear?”

Harlan, shocked by the name of the Crow chief, smiled widely.

“What does the white man find so funny?” asked White Bear, letting a flash of anger race across his eyes at these apparent bad manners.

“The chief has a great and strong name,” replied Harlan in a convincing tone meant to relax the chief and reduce his doubts about the man sitting before him.

The chief sat back against a backrest and studied this bold yet calmly surprising white man closely. He discerned that Harlan was a man of strength who lacked fear, and his instincts said the man before him was not two-faced, like many white men, but honorable. He appeared to be gracious and learned in the ways of the Crow, among other things understanding the meaning behind the sacred pipe ceremony. His many scars spoke to his ability as a fighter. Truly, this is a man to be reckoned with and respected because he knows and lives “the way.” thought the chief.

Harlan had already discerned that this chief was a noble man. He began to explain the reason for his visit in the Crow language.

“Chief White Bear, I have an adopted son, a daughter, and a wife, and the two women are each now carrying a child. They are all from the great Crow Nation, having been captured by the Northern Cheyenne and the Snakes in years past and made into slaves.

I also have two younger sons from the Crow Nation whose parents were killed by the Lakota and Northern Cheyenne several years ago. I discovered the last two young men after the battle as the only survivors and have raised them as my own.

The first three I spoke of I purchased from the Snake and Northern Cheyenne. I purchased the two women because they are the sisters of the two young boys. The other young man I purchased last year from the Snakes because he saved my life and the lives of the rest of the family from bad white men. He, like all my boys, is a great warrior.

The two women are also brave fighters, having already killed Northern Cheyenne warriors in battle, and will bear many strong children. It is because of them that I come with a request. All of them would like to return to the great Crow Nation to live with and learn about their own kind.”

Harlan paused in his story to try to read Chief White Bear’s reaction to he had just said. It was obvious that the chief was listening carefully if the look in his eyes meant anything.

Harlan continued, “My family and I have been in many battles over the years with bad white men and enemies of the Crow, the Northern Cheyenne.”

He left out the killing of the six horse-stealing Crows the winter before, for obvious reasons. “We are small in number, and there are many around us who would like to kill us and take our furs and other goods. It is with those thoughts that we would like to join up with your band and follow you north to the land of your ancestors.

We would like to trap beaver and kill buffalo as well as trade and live in peace among your people. Your band is strong and would be made even stronger by the addition of my family and our straight-shooting Hawken rifles.

If it pleases you, at the end of the rendezvous, we would like to become part of your band and move north to live quietly with you in the land of the Crow.”

Finished, Harlan sat back, looking long and hard at the Crow chief for any sign of his feelings regarding what had been said.

“You are a brave and strong man, white man. How are you named?” abruptly asked the chief.

“My name is Harlan Waugh, mountain man and friend to the Crow,” Harlan answered.

“Well, friend to the Crow, you may join my band as we go north to our homelands after the rendezvous. I would be happy to have four more brave warriors in my band with their long-shooting Hawkens,” Chief White Bear replied with a big grin.

Rising, he extended his hand in the sign of peace to Harlan, and Harlan rose and accepted. Harlan noticed that the chief’s handshake was almost crushing in strength, reminding him of the grip of his friend Tom “Iron Hand” Warren, keel boatman who was an ex-mountain man, and also a man-mountain of considerable power and courage.

Yes, here is a real man, Harlan thought. “I have some gifts for Chief White Bear,” he announced.

Before the chief could respond, Harlan strode outside to his waiting horse and mule. The warriors were still gathered in front of the tepee, as were now about a dozen curious women and children. Unpacking the mule, Harlan brought forth a Hawken rifle, a keg of powder, five pigs of lead, and accessories to service the rifle.

Turning, he handed the prized items to Chief White Bear, who had followed him from the tepee. The chief stood in amazement at the precious gifts of deep meaning. None of his tribe could afford such a weapon or would be allowed to purchase one from the traders at the rendezvous because they were the hated Crow.

They were allowed to trade only for the poorer-quality Hudson Bay fusils of flintlock fame. Before he could recover from the receipt of such a gift, Harlan reached for the item he had luckily brought along as a present. Unpacking a large roll from the mule, he brought forth the massive hide of the great white bear and rolled it out fur side up in the grass in front of the chief, to the sheer amazement of all who had gathered around.

In a second, all backed off several steps at the revelation of the power the albino grizzly hide represented! The look on the chief’s face showed that he was awe struck at receiving such a magnificent gift.

“This is for the great chief of the Crows, White Bear,” Harlan announced. Now the chief would know why Harlan had smiled when the chief had revealed his name.

The chief just stood before the bear hide, then finally knelt down and touched it reverently. Harlan could tell he had a friend for life.

“When will my Crow brothers leave?” Harlan asked to break the spell and let the chief understand no gifts were expected from him in return.

Looking up, the chief said, “We will return to our land in two days. If the great bear killer and his family wish to ride with us, we would be pleased to call them our own.”

Again sticking out their hands in a sign of friendship, the two men shook like both of them meant it. With that and the sign of peace, Harlan rode back to his brood with the news of the meeting. Looking back over his shoulder as he rode off, Harlan could see the Crows still gathered around the great white bear hide in awe over such a gift presented to their chief.

Yes, Harlan thought with newfound hope in his heart, we have a new family and a friend for life! A new beginning, that is for sure. Now we have safety in numbers and a new land to explore.